Wednesday, September 13, 2006

9/11: More Than Words

Yes, I was there on September 11, 2001. I stood transfixed at the corner of Maiden Lane and William St. at 9:02 AM, watching the conflagration in the North Tower when the world shook yet again as a 2nd Boeing 767 struck the South Tower with a seismic violence heretofore unfelt. Yes, I fled for my life, east down Maiden Lane, at 9:59 AM as a miasmic dust cloud, once the flesh and bones of a 110 story building, overtook Lower Manhattan. And yes, I lived and continue to live with the trepidation and uncertainty that all New Yorkers, nay, Americans face in this volatile post 9/11 world.

Yet in the weeks and months after, this wordsmith struggled to express to both himself and others the myriad emotions that roiled inside. We, as a society, frequently take pains to communicate poignantly the sorrow, confusion, and despair that we feel in times of crisis and catastrophe. In those times we rely upon the gifts of artists and artisans around us to depict our sentiments with the force and subtlety necessary to act as an emotional salve.

I offer my most sincere gratitude to the visual artists of our great country who, when faced with the decree to represent the damaged collective psyche, didn't miss the mark. Finally now, when that instinctive need to comprehend the complex range of emotions associated with greatest tragedy of this nation arises, we need look no further than the image of an eagle crying blood crudely Photoshopped alongside a pilfered, stock photograph of the Twin Towers exploding and burning to their demise.